МЛЕЧНЫЙ ПУТЬ №3, 2016(18)

Who friendship with a knave hath made,Is judged a partner in the trade.The matron who conducts abroadA willing nymph, is thought a bawd;And if a modest girl is seenWith one who cures a lover's spleen,We guess her not extremely nice,And only wish to know her price.'Tis thus that on the choice of friends

Our good or evil name depends. A wrinkled hag, of wicked fame,Beside a little smoky flameSate hovering, pinched with age and frost;Her shrivelled hands, with veins embossed,Upon her knees her weight sustains,While palsy shook her crazy brains:She mumbles forth her backward prayers,An untamed scold of fourscore years.

About her swarmed a numerous broodOf cats, who, lank with hunger, mewed. Teased with their cries, her choler grew,And thus she sputtered: 'Hence, ye crew.Fool that I was, to entertainSuch imps, such fiends, a hellish train!Had ye been never housed and nursed,I, for a witch had ne'er been cursed.To you I owe, that crowds of boys

Worry me with eternal noise;Straws laid across, my pace retard,The horse-shoe's nailed (each threshold's guard), The stunted broom the wenches hide,For fear that I should up and ride;They stick with pins my bleeding seat,And bid me show my secret teat.''To hear you prate would vex a saint;Who hath most reason of complaint?'

Replies a cat. 'Let's come to proof.Had we ne'er starved beneath your roof,We had, like others of our race,In credit lived as beasts of chase.'Tis infamy to serve a hag;Cats are thought imps, her broom a nag;And boys against our lives combine,Because, 'tis said, you cats have nine.'

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